Chapter 37
Sebastian had first encountered Alexandrie Sauvage years before, during the war in the Peninsula.
The daughter of a prominent Parisian physician, she’d grown up determined to become a doctor herself, despite the restrictions placed by society on those of her sex.
Trained as a physician at Bologna in Italy, where such things were allowed, she’d been tending to the medical needs of a unit of French cavalry when they captured Sebastian in the mountains of Portugal.
In the process of escaping, he’d killed her lover, and she’d vowed to kill Sebastian in revenge.
The complicated tangle of events that had brought Alexi to England had, in the end, helped save Gibson’s life.
But while Sebastian no longer questioned her devotion to his friend, a definite wariness persisted between Sebastian and the enigmatic Frenchwoman.
He knew she had never entirely forgiven him for killing the man she’d once loved.
And a part of Sebastian remained unconvinced that she’d completely given up her own lethal intentions.
Arriving at the ancient stone house in Tower Hill, Sebastian found Gibson sprawled in a chair drawn up beside the parlor’s fire.
He was in his shirtsleeves, his cravat askew, his face pale and unshaven.
He had his head thrown back, his eyes closed, his mouth sagging open as his chest lifted rhythmically with his snores.
Sebastian had seen his friend lost in an opium haze too many times not to know what he was looking at.
And he felt a rush of raw fury, followed quickly by pity and helplessness and a sick sense of dread.
How long? he wondered as he turned away to cut through the kitchen and take the muddy garden path to the outbuilding by the back gate. How long could Gibson go on like this without killing himself?
How long?
Through the building’s open door he could see Alexi Sauvage carefully laying out her surgeon’s tools beside a woman’s naked cadaver.
Now somewhere in her thirties, Alexi was built small and almost unnaturally thin, with a riot of flaming red hair, milky white skin, and a dusting of cinnamon across her high-bridged nose.
At Sebastian’s approach, she looked up, her face expressionless as she watched him walk toward her.
“How much opium did he eat?” said Sebastian without preamble, his hands coming up to grasp the weathered frame at his sides as he paused in the doorway.
She crossed her arms at her chest and leaned back against the wooden shelf behind her. “I take it you saw Paul?”
“I saw him. How much did he take?”
“Enough to kill most men.”
“Why?”
“Why?” she echoed, her eyebrows drawing together.
“You should know why better than most.” She flung out one splayed hand, then let it drop again.
“The phantom pains from his missing leg might be gone, but I know of no magic box of mirrors that can take away all the other pains that war left him with—the memories of the men he’s somehow convinced himself he might have saved if only—” Her voice cracked, and she looked away, blinking.
“I’m sorry,” said Sebastian.
She nodded in silent acknowledgment, her throat working as she swallowed.
Sebastian forced himself to look at what was left of Jenna Diamond, lying on the slab between them. “What can you tell me about the way she died?”
Alexi Sauvage cleared her throat. “Judging from the bruising on her arms, around her mouth, and on the back of her neck, I’d say someone grabbed her, clamped his hand over her mouth so she couldn’t scream while he dragged her to the pond, and then held her under until she quit struggling and died.”
Sebastian studied the young girl’s pale, even features, so deceptively serene in death.
“Damn,” he swore under his breath, his arms dropping to his sides as he turned away.
He stood for a moment, his gaze on the last vestiges of snow melting in the garden.
Then he slapped one hand against the doorframe and said it again. “Damn, damn, damn.”
Alexi said, “The reason I sent you the note is because this isn’t the first time I’ve seen her—Jenna, I mean.”
Sebastian turned to stare at her.
“I met her about a month ago, near the end of October,” Alexi was saying.
“She came to me because she’d been violated, and she’d heard I could give her a tea that would help bring on her menses.
” Alexi might have trained as a physician, but because England didn’t allow women to be doctors, she served as a midwife instead.
“She was with child?” said Sebastian.
Alexi shook her head. “Not that she knew. But after what had happened to her, she wanted to make certain there would be no…consequences.”
“Who did it? Did she say?”
“She did. Five men—five gentlemen.”
My God, thought Sebastian, remembering the frightened young woman he’d watched testify at Alison Cross’s inquest. “Did she recognize any of them?” he asked, although he knew only too well where this was going.
Alexi nodded. “She knew them from Chalk Farm. She could even remember three of their names from having heard them talk amongst themselves in the tavern: Bridgewood, Keebles, and Toole.”
Sebastian was conscious of a rush of pure rage as he stared down at the dead girl’s pale face.
“There’s more,” said Alexi.
He raised his gaze to meet hers.
She said, “A week or two before Jenna came to me, a different woman had asked for my help—not for herself, but for her young niece. The girl had also been violated by five gentlemen. She was only fifteen, and the poor child was so ashamed of what had been done to her that she’d tried to hide it from everyone—including her aunt.
” Alexi paused, her features hardening. “By the time I got to her, there wasn’t anything I could do. She bled to death.”
“It was the same five gentlemen?”
“The girl never named them—frankly, I don’t think she even knew their names. But what are the odds?”
“Who was she?”
“I can’t tell you.”
He stared at her. “What do you mean, you can’t tell me? Why not?”
“You know why. It’s for the same reason that fifteen-year-old child hid what had happened for as long as she did: because she knew her world.
She knew what her life would be like—knew the shame her family would feel—if the truth were to get out.
She hadn’t done anything wrong; she was the victim.
But she couldn’t bear the thought of anyone knowing what she’d been through, of people whispering about her, looking down on her family because of it.
And that, combined with memories of what those men had said and done to her, was too much for her.
She essentially killed herself because of it.
And I’m not going to expose either that dead child or her family to what she died to prevent. I can’t betray her trust.”
“Even if it could help save lives? Someone has now murdered five people. Five. Do you think the killing is over? Because I don’t.”
Alexi shook her head. “The deaths of Jenna Diamond and Alison Cross are more than tragic, they’re an outrage. But those other three—Keebles, Toole, and Upcott? As far as I’m concerned, they deserved everything that happened to them. They’re murderers. I’m glad they’re dead.”
“Did Alison Cross come to you for the same reason?”
“No. I’d never seen or heard of her before she ended up on Paul’s slab.”
When Sebastian remained silent, Alexi said, “Does what I’ve told you help make any sense of what is happening?”
He nodded. “It might. It just might.”